


Life and Times of A Savior in Neverland

by laniew1



Series: The Lost Girl [3]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-19
Updated: 2014-04-19
Packaged: 2018-01-20 01:30:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1491787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laniew1/pseuds/laniew1
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Strangers descend on Neverland</p>
            </blockquote>





	Life and Times of A Savior in Neverland

**Author's Note:**

> Peter is still not Gold’s father in any way shape or form. So consider this completely AU now.

**Life and Times of a Savior in Neverland**

 

She can’t tell if it’s because of the magic of Neverland failing or something else… they age. Not a lot, it’s barely noticeable in the younger ones.

But some of them…

Felix has been with Peter the longest and he looks about eighteen or nineteen now, he’s of course much, _much_ older than that and she tries not think about how old that makes Peter.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Years go by, she doesn’t know how many. She didn’t mark time; even at the beginning because there’s nowhere else she wants to be. Even though Peter barely even curls into her in bed any longer, sometimes she doesn’t know why he bothers to even come to her if he’s just going to perch on the edge and watch her sleep.

He doesn’t have sex with her, doesn’t kiss her or touch her and sometimes she thinks he barely remembers that she’s even there.

 

******************************************************************************

 

People come, _adult_ people that she doesn’t know and they have a boy with him. Peter doesn’t meet them, Felix and some of the others do and then they’re dead and the boys fleeing.

“ _What_ is going on?” she demands of Felix when the boys have given up the chase and allowed Peter to play whatever game he’s playing.

She’s angry that they planned things and didn’t let her know what’s going on.

“The boy is the one we’ve been waiting for,” Felix says, there’s a thread of relief in his voice, like he hadn’t thought that they’d actually be able to fix the Neverland and it’s magic before time ran out for all of them.

 

******************************************************************************

 

There are other people on the island, she doesn’t know _them_ either though they come on a pirate ship which means they can’t be from where she came from.

They’re looking for the boy, the group of them; most of them hovered around a man who looks more and more distraught.

Peter has revealed himself to the boy, Henry and secreted them away in one of the alternate camps. Emma is supposed to be there too but Peter is entirely focused on Henry and his heart so Emma goes with another group of the boys to keep an eye on the ones who came by ship.

There’s not supposed to be any interaction, Peter has said not to, they’re only supposed to keep an eye on them, but Alex, one of the young ones throws a rock and then someone else shoots an arrow and then it’s an all-out little fight.

Emma goes to disappear into the forest and there’s someone behind her, with a blade at her throat and she goes still.

“Don’t move,” the man says, she’s got the hood of her cloak up and she raises her hands in surrender but the moment he lowers his blade she goes to dart away.

“I don’t think so,” a woman says and she does something with her hands that flashes purple sparks at her and she crumples.

 

******************************************************************************

 

She’s trussed up like one of the rabbits that they turn on the spit over the fire and she struggles against the bonds.

“I think our guest is finally awake,” a male someone says in a calm voice, she finds herself turned and twisted into a sitting position by hands she doesn’t want on her. She continues to struggle.

“You’re only going to hurt yourself, dear,” the woman who threw the purple sparks at her says; she has the blackest of hair and is immaculately dressed; she sounds like she doesn’t care one way or another.

“Regina,” another woman says softly.

“I didn’t think Pan took any girls,” the man with the metal hook says, he can only be Captain Hook and she’s at least heard stories of him.

“There was only ever one,” the distraught man says slowly, he’s walking forward slowly and he kneels in front of her. He reaches a hand out to touch her face and she snaps her teeth at him. Even if Peter doesn’t want her any longer that doesn’t give anyone else the right to touch her without her permission.

“Emma?”

The group as a whole startles, with the exception of Captain Hook, two of those people murmur to each other but the man is looking at her.

“If you let me go maybe Peter won’t kill you,” she snarls.

“Emma,” he says again, soft voice filled with wonder, a slight smile on his face. “They call me Neal now, but it used to be Baelfire.”

She blinks at him, just looks, he’s older of course, he left Neverland but she can see the traces of the boy that he used to be.

“Bae?”

They look at each other and she doesn’t know what Bae is seeing but she sees a man that has somehow made peace with himself instead of the boy who battled with himself and his demons.

Of course that’s when Peter shows up, he doesn’t carry a sword or arrows, he has a knife at his hip but he also has the ability to use what remains of the magic on the Neverland.

“ _Let her go_ ,” he snarls and his eyes are the hard, dark eyes that she remembers from right after she came to the Neverland.

“I propose a trade,” a man says.

“No,” Peter says, there’s a skirmish, the men, with the exception of Bae rushing him and Peter doing his disappearing thing and reappearing right behind a woman with cropped dark hair. He already has his knife out and pressed to her throat.

“Mary Margaret,” the man who had captured her says, he’s moving forwarding.

“David,” her eyes are already filling with tears.

“But if you are dead set on trading, let her go and I’ll not slit Snow White’s throat,” Peter says instead. His eyes are locked on Emma’s and there’s emotion there for the first time in _forever_.

David waves a hand and Bae cuts the ropes binding her feet and then helps Emma to a standing position, she doesn’t need the help and she would brush off his hands if they weren’t still tied in front of her.

She stumbles forward and when she reaches them Peter kind of shoves Mary Margaret or Snow White or whatever the hell her name is away and then he’s patting down Emma, cutting the ropes binding her wrists checking her for injuries.

He wraps his arms around her and she clings to him, he presses kisses to her forehead and temple and she tries not to sob too loudly.

 

******************************************************************************

 

They want the boy back, Emma knows this.

“He’s going to save Neverland,” Peter says, Emma sits pressed to his side, the boys circling them from behind. Across from them, over a fire that casts shadows everywhere the group sits.

“He’s just a boy,” Rumpelstiltskin says.

“He has the heart of the truest believer,” Peter says. “He’s going to save Neverland.”

Bae is biting his lips, Emma thinks he wants to say something but he keeps looking over at Snow White and Prince Charming and apparently changing his mind.

“And what exactly does ‘saving Neverland’ entail?” Regina asks all calm and cultured voice. It kind of grates on her, she’s apparently seeing them as nothing but children which is fine, they can probably use that somehow.

“Sacrifice,” Peter says and even Emma looks at him askance.

“We’re not killing him,” she says firmly and Peter looks at her with a puzzled expression while all the grown-ups look horrified.

“I didn’t say anything about killing him,” Peter says.

“I hope you’re serious about that,” Bae says hotly, Peter had always managed to ruffle his feathers the most. “That’s your son after all.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

After they manage to peel Peter’s hands from around Bae’s neck and the adults and boys all stop waving their weapons they all retreat back to their own sides of the fire. The boys are bristling with anger and Bae keeps pushing Rumpelstiltskin’s hands away.

“We thought Emma was going to die,” Bae says, his voice sounds rough and he’s rubbing at his neck.

“We?” Peter asks, eyes narrowed, posture stiff and unyielding. He’s clinging to Emma’s hand though, fingers laced together, clenching tightly.

“Tink and me,” Bae says softly, “we thought Emma was going to die and you would kill the boy out of grief or rage or something.”

“I brought water from the falls,” Peter says, Hook’s posture straightens. “I brought it from the falls and I saved Emma and I would have saved our son too.”

“We couldn’t be sure,” Bae says. “We couldn’t take that chance.”

“So what? You stole him? You took him away and…” Emma squeezes Peter’s hand, her other wraps around his arm, like she needs both hands on him to hold herself to the ground. “You let us believe he was dead.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

“Peter,” she murmurs and lays her head against his shoulder, his hand comes up to touch the back of her head and he kisses her forehead.

She can feel the curve of his smile and she smiles herself a little.

Their son is alive.

 

******************************************************************************

 

Peter keeps hold of her hand as they maneuver the group through the forest; he makes noises like the speed at which they’re moving is hurting something within him.

She can kind of understand, because they’re moving at a snail’s pace.

“It’s a spell,” he says and she looks at him. “It needs blood from the truest believer.”

“Why all the secrecy then?” she asks, she moves ahead of him so Peter is shielding her from view. The way that Mary Margaret and David, along with the others look at her is disconcerting. She doesn’t like it.

“It’s blood magic,” Peter says finally. “Once it’s done I won’t be able to leave Neverland, if I do,” he squeezes her hand. “Neverland won’t exist anymore.”

She looks back at him and he looks sad, so unbearably sad and she hates it.

“If you try to send me away I’ll never forgive you.”

“They’re your parents,” Peter says softly and Emma makes a noise that she guesses conveys her need for more information. “Snow White and Prince Charming or Mary Margaret and David or whatever names they’re going by. They’re your parents; they sent you away so that you could come back as an adult and break a curse, but…”

“But you stole me away to Neverland before I got to,” Emma says, she smiles at him because she regrets nothing; she has Peter and the boys and now their son.

“Yes, I knew you were tied to the truest believer but I didn’t know how, I thought,” he shrugs, looking young suddenly, like he had when she’d first laid eyes on him. “But then you were Emma and I really didn’t care.”

 

******************************************************************************

 

Henry is sitting at the campfire with some of the other boys when they come through the clearing, he looks at them, stands and there’s this expression in his eyes.

Like he _knows_ who they are to him and Emma wonders how Peter didn’t see it before.

“I never lied to him,” Bae says from behind them, Emma twists to look at him. “I told him about you and Pan and… well the only not truthful thing I told him was that you were dead, but I can probably be forgiven that because I didn’t actually know you were still alive.”

 

 

******************************************************************************

 


End file.
